Milford residents put up stink over sewer project

Published 11:03 pm, Monday, August 2, 2010

MILFORD -- Something stinks in the Rosemary Court neighborhood near the West Haven border, and some residents say it is the city's reluctance to move forward with an $800,000 sewer project.

Several residents urged the Board of Aldermen at its meeting Monday night to restore the project to the 2011-15 Capital Improvement Plan that the board later approved unanimously.

Claire Phelan, of Grove Street, said her septic system, despite her best efforts to maintain it, is failing rapidly. "My backyard borders the Oyster River estuary, and this is a problem that affects all of us.

"But my understanding is that the funds are in place, but the project is on hold because of opposition by some in the neighborhood who are not burdened by failing septic systems," she said.

Other residents described having to stagger their showers and bring their dirty clothes to a laundry to avoid overtaxing failing septic systems.

Rep. Richard Roy, D-119, who lives nearby on Howe Street, said that the Oyster River had once been a trout stream topped with a wooden plank bridge, "right out of Tom Sawyer or Huck Finn. But it isn't that way now; the river is choked with phragmites," the legislator said. "I support putting a sewage pumping station on Rosemary Court to protect the river and Long Island Sound."

Sewer Commissioner Michael Brown questioned why Mayor James L. Richetelli Jr. had removed the Grove Street-Rosemary Court sewer project from his capital improvement plan when the commission had listed it as its top priority.

But Richetelli said that the project, first proposed in 2001, dropped off the capital plan this year because funding has been approved and the pumping station and pipes designed. "When we held a public hearing there was significant opposition by some residents who objected to having a pumping station on the beach.

"We decided to poll the residents and it was 11 to 10 in favor of the project, with several not voting. I don't consider that a consensus and the project was put on hold."

Alderman Ray Vitali, R-5, said that an 11-10 vote "is a consensus. No one on this board wants to be in the position that these people are in, though I have no idea why anyone wouldn't want to tie in to sewers."

Richetelli said that the sewer commission, not he, put the project on hold. "The work can get done if the residents go back to the commission and tell them they want it," the mayor said. "It's not up to me or to this board."

"But we had our engineers look at it again and they tell us that is the only way to handle the sewage in that area," the mayor said.